


Shhh...

by AnitaNortherbloodDiAleus



Category: Almost Human
Genre: Drinking, F/M, First Time, Friends With Benefits, Hidden Hello Kitty Cameo, Oral Sex, Post-Case, Relaxation Rituals, S01e05 Blood Brothers, Sex, Sexual Content, Smoking, alternative ending, high five
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-05-19
Updated: 2014-05-19
Packaged: 2018-01-25 17:23:30
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 9,417
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1656425
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/AnitaNortherbloodDiAleus/pseuds/AnitaNortherbloodDiAleus
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Alternative ending to Blood Brothers, where Kennex convinces Sandra to join him for a drink, and Sandra convinces Kennex to stop talking.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Shhh...

**Author's Note:**

  * For [Sunhawk](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Sunhawk/gifts).



> I don't own these characters, I only borrow them occasionally for your enjoyment and mine. I gain nothing except the satisfaction of having written this piece and the satisfaction of your enjoyment, so please let me know if you like it!
> 
> This work is intended for readers aged 18 and up.

John leaned his head into the door frame of Captain Maldonado’s office and rapped his knuckles on the door.

“Y’okay?”

The Captain looked up from the flimsy celo file, steadying her gaze over her reading glasses till her eyes focused on Kennex’s face, and then glanced back down to the file as if to continue reading.

“I'm fine, John. Thank you.”

“Okay. Just checking.” John straightened and took a step forward, inviting himself in over the threshold into her office. He stood with his hands clasped behind him as if in parade rest, and as Sandra realized that he was still there and still intent on engaging her in further conversation, she reached up to the bridge of her nose and slid the black readers off her face with two fingers. Resolutely, she folded the frames in her hands and set them in her lap.

Sandra smiled and pursed up her lower lip and said, “This was a tough day for all of us, John… but we got him.”  
  
Yeah, we did.”

“How's Dorian?” Sandra asked after a breath.

John took a deep and quick breath himself and exhaled forcefully before he continued. “He's fine. Uh, Rudy's working on him now and he should be good to go by tomorrow. It was minor. I'd call it a ‘flesh wound,’ but... Well, you know."

John smiled a knowing smile, that charming boyish grin that Sandra was glad to see had resurfaced as of late, and she returned it.

John lowered his head and stretched his neck to the side and added, “So, where are you headed now?”

Sandra tucked her chin to her chest and pressed her lips together as if she was having a tiny, 10-second meeting with herself regarding her response before she spoke; she really wasn't _headed_ anywhere at the moment, unless you considered 45 minutes of paperwork review a ‘place.’ Sure, the paperwork would keep, but it would also be nice to come in bright and early to a clean desk, paperwork done, and its matter a memory of the day before. Once adjourned, she raised her head and started to talk when John spoke again. She closed her mouth as he started to speak, yielding and allowing him to continue, yet raised an eyebrow subtly up in mild annoyance.

 _'Damn over talkers,_ ’ she thought to herself as she listened to Kennex rattle off. _'Rude.'_

“You wanna... you wanna grab a drink? …go shake it off a little bit?” John’s eye brows slid up with the question, and Sandra studied his face for a moment as she sat thinking, eyes flitting left-eye to right-eye before she pursed her lips and inhaled through her nose. She rose from the chair and walked around to the front of the desk and leaned back against it, lacing her fingers around her glasses and crossing them against her thighs. She raised her head to John as she responded.

“I'm fine, John. Really. You don’t have to worry about me. I didn't take a word of what he said to heart.” Ethan Avery was a complete and utter narcissistic bastard of the highest order, and Sandra had regarded him clinically, classifying him for what he was – a cold-blooded sociopath. He’d tried to chink the armor, and might have left a nick or two with his verbal stabs, but nothing that was permanent.

John tucked up his lower lip and shrugged, saying, “I didn't think you did. I just... wanted a little company and wondered if you might.”

With a blink, she changed her mind.

Not for any other particular reason than that she could.

“Yeah, okay. Whad’ja have in mind...?”

“McQuaids?”

“No.” Sandra pushed out with disdain. She eyed Kennex for a moment and said, “I know where we can go. Gimme ten minutes to wrap up.”

“I’ll be here!” John called out with a turn and a wave and headed out of her office towards the bullpen.

*****

As they crossed the platform to the wall kiosk, Sandra pulled out her wallet and retrieved a blue card. She slid the card into the machine and tapped the glowing blue screen that said _Transit Passes_ ; she touched her way quickly through the clearly-familiar menu until two ticket credits appeared on the screen. Sandra retrieved the card and swiped it twice at the entrance and then led the way to wait on the proper side to catch the light rail that would whisk them across to the Renewl District near the river.

“So, where’re we headed?”

“To my bar. The Egyptian.” Sandra rocked forward slightly and peered down the line to watch for the train.

“Oh, yeah? I've never been. I hear they've got a 4-star rating,” Kennex said, with a touch of sarcasm.

 _‘Great. Fancy,’_ he thought to himself, and sighed thinking on how he was most likely going to blow through his weekly drinks-budget tonight on a few measly cocktails.

A smooth light train approached the platform and the doors slid open with a gasp of hydraulic compression.

Sandra stepped forward and into the train, John following behind, and said, “I like it because they know me there and they pretend not to know me. They leave me alone to enjoy myself. In peace. I need that.”

“Yeah, tell me about it. I need my peace and quiet. It grounds me. That’s what keeps me sane. That’s the thing that allows me to have days like today and not go to the zoo, you know?”

“Indeed. It’s important for me to decompress after a case -- give myself something to do while my brain sorts itself out.”

“I think we all need that.”

The doors slid shut with another puff of air and the train began to accelerate, going from zero to full speed in a matter of seconds. The car rocked smoothly along and the lights from the skyline streaked the darkening dusk.

After a moment of silence in which they watched the cityscape blur by, Sandra added, head facing the window, “After a day like today, there are several things that I do to shake it off. Three, to be exact.”

“Well, then, ‘Lead on, Macduff.’”

*****

The Egyptian resided on the top floor of an upscale-looking building, much swankier than any of the bars that John typically frequented. He would have preferred something that was a bit more of a dive (bars like this always made him feel like he had to be extra cautious or he was going to break something, not least of which might be the bank). Besides, why pay a week’s salary on something you could get much cheaper elsewhere? Nonetheless, John wasn't in it to just have a cocktail tonight. He needed camaraderie; he needed a moment just to show the captain that he was okay and that she was okay (and also to make sure that she was okay, and that he was okay, too).

The inside was plush and velvety, almost other-worldly; it had a retro quality to it, with recessed art deco lights and sconces but mixed with modern appointments. Sandra seemed very at home in the posh bar, and walked confidently across the warmly-lit room towards the bar proper. The air seemed to hum, and down a corridor the sound of two billiards balls knocking together punctuated the music lilting through the room.

“What do you drink, Kennex?”  
  
“Anything that doesn't drink me first.” John smiled again, leaning in just slightly as he spoke to close the height differential.

Maldonado smiled a tired smile that seemed to almost illustrate a contrasting emotion that lie just beneath the surface; somehow, the smile on her lips made the tang of bitterness seated in her eyes all that more apparent. It was subtle, hardly noticeable unless you really knew her, but it was there. “Johnnie Walker Swing, Neat. Times two,” she said with a slight head nod towards Kennex. “On me, by the way.” John nodded his head in a sign of thanks.

The bartender pulled the round-bottomed bottle off of the shelf and poured a portion into two tumblers. It was Swing Superior (Original Swing was nearly $3,400 a bottle) but Maldonado drank it more out of nostalgia than anything else.

As John glanced around and eyed the décor, his gaze lighted on a couple of plush curved booths across the bar. Maldonado watched him eye the booths and wondered if his leg might be more comfortable in the lower-positioned chairs versus the tall barstools.

“C’mon, John.”

She slid off of the barstool and crossed the room to the booth and John followed. As John sauntered he took a sip of the smoky liquor and blew a firey breath out after his swallow. “Whew,” he breathed.

They slid into the booth, and Sandra propped herself up on her fists to shift herself across the velvety bench seat.

Once they were settled, Sandra lifted her glass to John and said, “Cheers. Here’s to all of us. Here’s to the good guys.” John raised his glass companionably, eyes locked on Sandra’s, and they both took a drink.  
  
They sat in silence for a moment, sipping, until they both started to speak at once.

After a chuckle, John made a face and Maldonado said, “You first,” through a grin.

John looked down and watched as he swirled the spicy brown liquid in his glass and said, “So, how’d you become a cop? And how come I’ve known you for more than a decade and I don’t know this story?”

Maldonado glanced down at her own glass for a moment and then back up at John and she said, “My dad was an alderman in the 26th ward in Chicago when I was growing up. He was a civic leader and worked closely with the cops -- knew everyone on the beat. He always wanted a boy, someone who would carry on the family name. He never said it out loud to me in so many words or anything like that, but I could always tell. That was almost worse, I think. He loved me in his own way, but I always felt like he felt… an emptiness. I tried to fill it. I played sports, went perch fishing in Lake Michigan with him – you know, tomboy stuff. He was always worried that I wasn’t going to be able to take care of myself.

She took another sip and then continued.

“My grandfather, my mom’s dad, owned a bar in downtown Chicago off of Division; it was basically a narrow, brick hole-in-the wall that was like a shotgun row house, skinny but deep, and all the cops used to hang out there. My mom was a waitress/bartender there for most of my growing up.”

“Sounds like McQuaid’s.”

“You’d be amazed.”

Suddenly it made sense to John as to why Maldonado might not necessarily want to frequent the cop hangout; maybe the familiarity of McQuaid’s brought up too many memories of home for it to be a place where she could just go in and have a simple drink. In peace. He sipped again and listened as Sandra continued.

“So, between my Dad’s work and my Grandpa’s bar, I grew up around cops. You know, in Chicago, being on the force is a way of life – it’s almost like a religion, you know? So, I got the idea to go to the police academy right out of junior college and worked my way up in the ranks -- mostly to prove to my dad that I could. Admittedly, I went into the force for what might have originally been the wrong reasons, but once I was in the academy, it just felt right. I excelled. And I never looked back. Right before he died, my Dad said ‘never give up – go all the way.’ He said he was proud of me. It made me…”

Kennex cut her off with a question, asking, “What do you think you would have done if you hadn't gone into the force?”

Sandra smirked and turned the tumbler in little circles on the table top and said, “I’d probably own a bar in Chicago.”

She chuckled and Kennex grinned, cocking his head to the side, and they sipped at their drinks.

“What about you?”

“Same. Well, I mean, you know; my old man was a cop, I grew up around it. Seemed right. Felt right.”

“And what do you think you’d be if you weren't a cop?”

“Shit. God only knows.”

“What would you want to be? What would you want to do?”

John sat and thought for a moment, and took another sip to pass the time while he thought.

“Well?”

“Man, I don’t know… Ehh, exotic dancer,” he finally blurted, and he waggled his eyebrows as he drained the rest of the swill while Sandra laughed, this time a fun and genuine laugh that wrinkled her eyes into slits and stretched the skin across high pretty cheek bones and caused her belly to pulse out with each guffaw.

John watched her laugh and put the tumbler back on the table and grinned. It was peculiar to see her in this environment, away from the unyielding antiseptic lights of the bullpen at the precinct. Seeing her chuckle in the warm and purposefully-dimmed lights of the Egyptian made her almost unrecognizable; John likened it in his mind to running into a colleague at the grocery store and not recognizing them for a moment because of the unexpected context. Like this, in this light, laughing gently while she finished her drink, if John squinted, she was just a woman at a bar, not his captain and superior officer.

“Two more?” John asked. “And mind if we switch it up?”

“Yes, please, and fine by me.”

Sandra watched John saunter back up to the bar, still smiling from his comment about the possible professional choice he might have made if he hadn't gone into police work. She let her eyes slip for a second to his legs, hips, jeans, and watched his stride. The friend and colleague in her remarked soundlessly to herself that he walked so smoothly, despite the prosthetic. It appeared that he was adjusting to it, growing into it, and she felt a touch of pride for the detective who had awakened from a two-year coma and come back to best obstacles and overcome trauma -- and come back strong. The woman in her saw something, too; her animal brain – the part of her thinking that was less tactical and decidedly more tactile – thought without words as she watched him lean across the bar. But her analytic brain suddenly flipped the lights back on and cognitively dashed a bucket of cold water across her thinking, shutting and locking the cage on her animal brain with a whip-crack and an upturned chair.

_‘Down, girl.’_

“Two SoCo’s, please. Straight, like before. And two water backs, no ice.”

John brought the drinks back to the table and passed a tumbler and a glass to her; “Maldonado,” he said, as if he was calling out her order, and then slid the other two in front of himself.

“Thanks, John.”

He settled in again across the curved booth from her and slid his hips to the edge of the seat, positioning himself until he was comfortable, and stretched out his prosthetic leg across his natural leg, crossing them at the ankles.  
  
“So. Three things you do to unwind after a case.”

“Hmm?” Sandra cocked her head to the side and narrowed her eyes as she swallowed a sip through a grin.

“On the train. You said there were three things you did to wind down after a case.”

She was impressed for a moment that Kennex had actually been listening to her when she spoke and nodded in understanding, affirming, “Yes. Three things. My personal post-tough-case three-part ritual.”

John nodded towards the tumbler in his hand and then glanced back at Maldonado; with the barest hint of sarcasm in his voice, he said, “Obviously, Number One is a dash of fancy-schmancy liquor in a nice bar (which I respect, although I personally could have left out the words ‘fancy,’ ‘schmancy,’ and ‘nice,’ and replaced the word ‘dash’ with ‘shitload’ to describe my perfect post-case relaxation scenario, but I’m not here to judge).”

Sandra rolled her eyes for a moment through a smile and then added, “Thank you.” He was such an asshole at times, but he seemed to come by it honestly, and it was never really as caustic or as agro as it appeared to be on the surface.

His bark was definitely worse than his bite.

She wondered what that might mean about his lick, and the thought made her grin, but again she mentally smacked herself at the thought and camouflaged the grin in and amongst another grin that was caused by Kennex’s comment.

“So. What’s the second thing? Number Two?”

Maldonado looked at him for a moment. She pushed back the deepening warming feeling that had resulted from the drinks and the laughter; she sobered, cleared her head, and made an assessment.

_Kennex._

_Out for a good time, no hidden agenda (unless it’s incredibly well hidden, which I don’t suspect); somehow, needling his way into my evening -- my down time. How? …and why? More importantly, let him in? Or block?_

It was hard to know. This was Kennex; the precinct problem child and yet a damn good cop; the broken golden boy with the steel leg – the walking miracle. She’d known him longer than almost anyone else at the precinct, and yet she could recall only a few times that they’d spent any one-on-one time together outside of the line of duty.

Should she?

Sure.

What the hell.

Why not?

Up to a point, she could always change her mind.

“All right. The second thing. Pay for the last round and let’s go.”

***** 

John and Sandra rode the elevator back down to the lobby and crossed to exit a revolving door.

“So. Where to now?”  
  
Sandra clipped along at a steady pace with the footsteps of a person who’d spent a lifetime taking two for everyone else’s one.

“Just down the block. We can walk, it’s not far.” They walked to the end of the street and crossed at the corner, and Sandra led them to a large brick building connected to a parking garage. The garage was well lit, and they walked to an elevator at the far end past several rows of parking. She held her face up to a panel on the wall to the right of the elevator doors, and once it scanned her and recognized her, the elevator button turned from red to green and she pushed it. Inside the elevator she scanned a card that telescoped from a retractable reel keycard lanyard attached to her belt and then pushed the button marked R.

The elevator took them all the way up to the top of the building and into a little steel and cement block stairwell with a door at the far end. She swiped the card again at the panel on the door and opened the door and stepped out onto the roof. The roof was a pleasant pebbled patio with a variety of potted plants, clustered back-lit little rock gardens, and several lounge chairs set up on one side; a hedge ran the perimeter of the roof in a planter on the far side of the safety rail, making the roof feel like a little garden.

“You live here?”

“Surprised?”

“Well, yeah, actually! I thought that you were a... suburb-dweller – not sure why I thought that…”

“Suburbs? No. I have to be able to be at the precinct in 10 minutes in the case of an emergency.”

“Sure…”

“Two minutes by helicopter, if necessary.” She gestured back towards the top of the adjacent parking garage to a set of concentric circles that must have been a helicopter pad.

“Right.”

Sandra walked across the patio to the far corner of the roof to a large potted plant and John followed her, eyes roaming the city skyline and the Wall in the distance. The skyline was incredible, all lit up; at this distance, the chaos looked beautiful, especially from certain angles where the Wall was only in the periphery.

“Wow. This is nice. So, is this number two?”

The wind rustled the tender leaves of the plants and trees dotting the rooftop. Another sound, the sound of scraping, took John’s eyes away from the view and back down to the pebbled surface of the roof top. Sandra was leaned down moving a heavy planter with a scrape to reveal a scratched-up little pink tin embossed with the black outline of a white-faced cartoon cat that had a fat red bow across its right ear. The thing looked ancient, clearly well-used, and she stood and grinned at Kennex who stared at her and at the box quizzically.

“This,” she said, rattling the box with a side-to-side shake, “is number two.”

Maldonado opened the hinged tin with a metallic pop to reveal an old fashioned lighter and a creased cardboard flip-top box with a camel on it set against a backdrop of pyramids.

John’s eyes widened in disbelief and he glanced cautiously around the roof.

“Are those… are those what I think that they are?”

Maldonado flipped the cardboard box open and pulled out one smooth white cigarette with a goldenrod and brown-flecked tip. Incidentally, cigarettes were not legally sold in the city anymore and they were hard to come by. They had been legally out of production for several years in most states in the country and the remaining stock of packaged cigarettes in warehouses and stores across the region was dwindling (and in some cases highly sought-after and collectible). There were still some black market manufacturers of cigarettes, but production was highly illegal and was often a source of criminal activity.

“I told you, I grew up in a bar. I happen to have a few of these left (and by few she meant cartons, but that was but a minor detail) and once they’re gone, they’re gone. I don’t do it very often, only after a particularly stressful case. Sometimes I just come up here to try and see stars and enjoy the view. But I think today qualifies as ‘particularly stressful.’ Now, if a droid comes by while you’re holding it? Snuff it immediately and I don’t know you.” She smiled and put the cigarette in her lips and flicked the lighter twice until the flame rose up and then lit the tip.

John watched the burning end trace a wake of gray smoke, real smoke, with a look of horror and fascination.

“Aw, c’mon, John -- one won’t kill you. Wanna drag?”

She chided him, knowing full well how hard it was for the detective to walk away from such a challenge. He took the smoke from Sandra and put it between his lips and took a tentative draw. He held it awkwardly between his thumb and forefinger and breathed it into his mouth and snarled at the taste. Sandra smiled at him took it back from him and held it expertly between two straight fingers and puffed quietly and lightly. She raised her eyebrows at Kennex as she exhaled a smooth column of pungent blue smoke and offered him the smoke again while crossing her other arm tightly across her middle against the night air.

John coughed and sputtered but took in another draw and blew it out again smoothly this time, mimicking the smoking that Maldonado was doing. As the nicotine entered his system, he felt his stomach drop and cheeks and chin tingle. They leaned over the edge of the steel safety railing and looked out into the breeze.

“This is nice – feels… really funny.”

“You never smoked?”

“Nah, by the time I was growing up it was pretty rare. I never did it. But I guess I knew people who did…”

Sandra took in a long slow drag and let it fall out of her mouth. The smoke dissipated into the wind that whipped across the roof as soon as it left her lips. The smoke was almost heavy (much heavier, John noticed, than regular e-cig vapor) and there was something sort of mesmerizing about the way Maldonado smoked, pushing the exhales through her lips and cradling her arm across her as she twisted in the breeze to keep warm.

John noticed Sandra shivering slightly and slid his jacket off and draped it around the Captain before she could protest. It swam on her, the waistband hanging down to her mid thigh. It enveloped her, still warm from Kennex’s body, and she drew it closer around her to keep it from slipping off from where it was draped over her shoulders. At that moment, the captain looked even more like a stranger to him; wisps of her hair had come out of her haphazard pony tail and were trailing across her face, and the jacket made her look even smaller than she already was.

“Thanks, John.”

She snubbed the last of the cigarette out after one last drag and stuffed the butt back into the box to nestle in and amongst other tightly rolled butts, stashed the lighter back in the tin, and stuffed the tin back under the planter.

Somehow, the few drags of the cigarette (even though they left his mouth and his face and hands smelling like a strange and unusual mix of blood and wood) caused a sensation to thrum through him that was decidedly not unpleasant, and it decidedly mixed and mingled with the liquor in an interesting one-two punch of relaxation.

“You know, Sandra. You may be on to something here.”

She pulled the jacket in around her and smiled at him again, genuine and round faced, and said, “meaning what?”

“I am beginning to see… the appeal. So far, I mean -- of your relaxation ritual.”

“Oh yeah?”

“Yeah.”

Sandra nodded, and glanced at Kennex’s shoes for a moment and then glanced back up into his face, saying nothing and revealing nothing.

_Let him ask if he wants to ask, but don’t volunteer. He’s so tipsy that he might not even…_

She opened her mouth and started to speak but Kennex jumped in before she could continue.

“What’s the third thing?”

 _‘Ugh. Again with the over-talking. Interrupters, I freaking swear,_ ’ Sandra thought to herself.

Sandra mentally squared off; it was decision time. She had sort of hoped that Kennex would drop the topic of her three-part relaxation ritual before the subject matter of the third and final part could be broached, because item number three was immanently… personal… and opening up this discussion could prove to be a zesty and effervescent splash into the bubbly and ever-inviting waters of the Rubicon, once crossed never to be uncrossed. But there was another part of her that was hoping that he would continue his inquiry so that she could look him in the face and tell him exactly what she wanted to do (and exactly what she wanted him to do – she was no wilting flower, and was well-practiced in the art of telling men exactly what she wanted them to do and making them do it, usually without having to ask twice).

Usually. This was Kennex, after all.

She rested her hands on her hips and stepped her feet slightly further apart and gazed into the middle distance of the lights flickering off of the buildings and the streets below, and said without looking at the detective, “John, I’m glad that we've had this time together. Tonight.”

John’s lips continued to smile but his eyes narrowed slightly as he sought to interpret Sandra’s meaning.

“Are you saying good night?”

Sandra slid the jacket down over her shoulders and handed it back to John who accepted it and slid his arms in one at a time. She looked up at John and said nothing for a moment, arms held akimbo on her hips.

This. THIS was why she never went to McQuaid’s.

_Stay out of the line of fire. Friendly fire, sure, but fire nonetheless._

Cops plus alcohol plus other cops? Divided by time spent together and multiplied by the intensity of their day-to-day? Physiology was physiology, and things were bound to happen. Amongst detectives and officers, incidences happened. Things…happened. Everyone knew the rules, and so everyone knew how important it was not to be caught…fraternizing. Cavorting. The not-getting-caught part was the critical piece, of course.

But between a detective and his captain?

Maldonado watched John’s face change as he waited for an answer, and she realized that he was quiet. He was staring at her face, watching her intently, forgotten in himself for a moment. He watched, waiting for her to tell him what the third thing was that completed her relaxation trifecta and suddenly, although she was standing perfectly physically still, the animal brain rattled the walls of its cage and began to pace back and forth behind her eyes.

Mentally and physically, she took a step towards John. The closeness of the distance between them forced Sandra to look up to be able to see him eye to eye. At this distance and because of the angle, the gaze through her brows added an intensity to her look, but suddenly there was something else there, something scorching -- something that smoldered. She dropped her chin slightly and parted her lips, and a breathy exhale floated out.

_Kennex._

_Gorgeous, dark, and sexy as hell. Manly. Gosh, it would be so easy… But would it? Am I thinking too hard about this? I am. I’m thinking too hard about this. Not a good sign. Mission aborted, meeting adjourned._

The look that burned behind her eyes quickly dissolved into another friendly smile. An easy, welcoming smile, and John smiled back.

“C’mon. Let’s go in. I’ll… Show you my apartment. And then… I’ll walk you down. Call you a cab.”

John grinned a resolved grin and then nodded knowingly. “Okay, cool. Thank God, by the way, ‘cause I have to pee like a race horse.”

Sandra chuckled as she and John crossed the roof and exited through a door that was opposite of the door they’d first come through. Once inside the echo-y stairwell, the orange acid light a stark contrast to the soft breezy light of the roof, Sandra crossed quickly to elevator and faced the panel until it scanned her face. As it recognized her, the elevator call button changed colors and she pressed to call it to their floor.

The doors slid open to reveal a very different atmosphere than that of the elevator from the parking deck to the roof. The interior of the car was a solid bank of mirrors on four sides; it was slightly unsettling to the uninitiated, suddenly seeing oneself on all sides, but Sandra was used to it and smiled at John, unnerved. He hated the feeling that he was suddenly checking out his hair and worse, looking himself over. It was off-putting, and his eyes kept flitting from surface area to surface area to find a safe place to rest, but he found that no matter where he looked, he was either looking at himself or Sandra, so he opted to look up (it was either that or look at his shoes, and that wasn't exactly the posture that he felt he needed to display at the moment). He cast his eyes up, of course, only to find that the ceiling was a mirror as well, and as he looked up he met his own eyes once again. Ridiculous, he thought, till he looked over to see the reflection of Maldonado watching himself work through the dilemma of where to look.

He saw her in the reflection of the ceiling, watching him glance from place to place, and lowered his craned neck to where he looked down at her. He stood nearly a foot taller than she did, and suddenly felt an overwhelming urge to bend down and get his face closer to hers. He didn't, but he thought about it, and something in the way that she looked at him made him wonder if she’d been thinking about the same thing.

Maldonado turned and looked ahead at the reflection of the two of them in the doors of the elevator and locked eyes with Kennex. Again he stood at parade rest, hands clasped behind his back, and the reflection of his back and his hands clasped over his butt bounced off of the back wall. Everywhere she looked there were infinite Kennex’s, all looking back at her, and for once – silent.

The car stopped and the doors slid open on her floor to reveal a cozy carpeted hallway lit by glass and steel fixtures along the walls.

“Mine’s right at the end of the hall.”

Maldonado led them to the last door on the right and tapped a key pad till a loud click resounded down the silent hall. “We’re on the 7th floor, by the way. I just want to pop in for a second, grab a jacket, and then we’ll grab you a cab. Feel free to use the facilities…”

She put her hand on the handle of the door and turned to Kennex with another smile.

“Welcome,” she said, warmly, then added, with the air of authority that John was so immediately familiar with that it almost served to snap him out of his casual demeanor, “wipe your feet. Cops track muck,” she said, adding a wink.

John entered the apartment and was not prepared for what he saw. The space was an open airy expanse flanked by a solid curved wall of windows that looked down onto the night-time cityscape. The first few steps led John into a kitchen that overlooked the living room and the vista beyond. To the right there were two doors, one to a bedroom and the other to a laundry room.

Sandra turned to John and said, “Make yourself at home, John. Just to the left behind the kitchen here is the hall bathroom; help yourself to whatever you need. I’ll only be a second.”

Sandra’s voice was quiet and low, with a touch of a raspy texture at the ends of the phrase that sounded perfect with her slight Midwestern accent. The accent was evidenced in the way that she said ‘John,’ the O laying down just a touch on the flat side so that it almost sounded like _Jahn_.

John led himself down the short hall and into the bathroom and shut the door. He washed his hands and face at the sink and swished some water through his mouth, thankful to wash the cigarette smoke off of him. He dried his hands on a plush white towel to the left of the sink.

He looked at his face in the mirror and asked himself for just a moment what the absolute fuck he was doing here at the Captain’s house, in her guest bathroom, wiping his hands on her fluffy perfect guest towel, and glancing up at the art poster that she had framed on the wall above the toilet. He crossed to the framed piece behind the commode and looked it over as he went about the business of ‘shaking the dew off of the lily leaf,’ as his dad used to say.

The poster was a print advertising a Chicago street music festival, 30 years long-since passed.

John flushed, washed his hands again and ran his fingers through the towel before clicking off the light switch and walking back into the kitchen. He leaned back against the counter and surveyed the lamp-lit apartment; it was luxurious but not overstated, appointed with clearly nice furniture that was rich but not gaudy. Two leather couches formed a conversation pit around a glass coffee table, and a china cabinet anchored on the wall flanked a dining room table and chairs. Several framed photographs topped the cabinet, and John noticed one in particular of a very young-looking Maldonado in dress blues with an American flag in the background.

Sandra.

Somehow he’d managed to learn more about this woman in one night than he ever had before. He knew her, of course he knew her – saw her every single day and worked almost as closely with her as he did with Dorian – but tonight he had seen a part of her that he’d never considered before, and it was… fascinating. So fascinating, in fact, that he wasn’t sure he was quite ready to end it. And the thing! What was the third thing? He had to know. He thought he might already have a pretty good idea about it, but he wanted to hear her say it. Wanted to hear her say…anything. Just…more.

John shuffled and swayed, clasping his hands together as Sandra entered carrying a light sweater and he said, “So! Whatya say? One more? Nightcap, then we call it?” John smiled and Sandra smiled back.

Without a word, Sandra crossed around the kitchen counter and stood opposite John and poured a wash of brown liquid into two small crystal tumblers. It was just a finger’s-worth, barely a mouthful, and she re-capped the decanter and slid it back until it was flush with the wall behind the counter.

“Night cap,” she said to John.

“Yes, thank you… nice place, by the way,” John started, glancing out the window. He led his eyes back to Sandra and gazed down on her. He held the tumbler without drinking it, and held his breath without realizing it.

Again, for the second time that night, Sandra stepped into John’s personal space; half intentionally, and half just because it happened.

_Animal brain._

John gazed down at her intently. They hadn’t said very much to each other in a minute or two, and John was starting to feel the weight of the silence.

“By the way, what’s the third…?”

Sandra stepped into his space even further so that now they faced each other, standing only inches apart, and she cut him off.

“You know the actual quote from Shakespeare is ‘Lay on, Macduff, and damned be him who first cries ‘Hold! Enough!’ The actual quote is more emphatic; basically, Macbeth wants Macduff to begin fighting immediately.”

“Shakespeare, too?”

“I’m full of surprises.”

Sandra looked up at John and John down to Sandra, and his face began to descend slowly towards hers.

Slowly, ever-so slowly; slowly enough that she could flinch and step back with a grin and it could all be a misunderstanding. Slowly enough that John could play it off and swear that he wasn’t leaning in for a kiss and he could go home via taxi and wank himself off very thoroughly in the shower and then go and pick his partner up in the morning and get donuts and wear his sunglasses and thank Maldonado for the drinks and call her ‘Captain’ and say, ‘thanks, Captain; we’ll get right on that.’

But she didn’t.

She didn't flinch.

She let Kennex’s face get closer and closer, and once she was sure that he was leaning in and it wasn't just her eyes and the bourbon playing tricks on her, she leaned up, stood up on tiptoes, and started to meet him half way.

They touched, initially bouncing off of each other’s noses like an astronaut in zero gravity making first contact on the moon might pop up before successfully finding his footing, and then they touched down again, only this time it was noses followed by lips, followed by hands winding around a sinewy torso and strong arms reaching down to encircle a petite waist. They kissed, and it gathered intensity until Kennex growled (which broke the lock off of the cage in Sandra’s animal brain and the beast got out and ran full tilt).

Sandra clung up at John and pushed her tongue into his mouth, relishing the heat and the smoothness and the wetness.

She pulled her mouth away from him hungrily and pushed her cheek up against his so she was pressed up into his ear, arms wound tightly around him.

“Okay, so number three. Here it is. Three. I like to come, John. That’s the third thing. I like to come. I like to push an orgasm out of myself that is so freaking perfect that I immediately pass out. Then, and finally then, I’m relaxed.”

John needed no further encouragement. The gauntlet was tossed, and he was ready. He brought his lips back to Sandra’s and reached in further to run his hands up the backs of her thighs until he could hoist her up against his body. He easily lifted her 5’ 2” frame and pressed it against himself, and she could feel him getting hard and filling his trousers.

She was practically seated on the thing.

“Which way,” John huffed, breathless from kissing.

“Walk forward. First door next to the _mmmph_ ,” she mouthed, for he was kissing her again and walking forward with one eye guiding him down the hall way. He pushed open a door to find a simple and neat master bedroom with a bed right in the middle and a window leading to a balcony overlooking the city.

John deposited Sandra onto the bed, and somewhere along the way as he’d carried her across the airy apartment, she’d pulled out the elastic holding back her hair and it now splayed luxuriously up behind her.

John stood back and started undressing himself, eyes on Maldonado as she lay back sprawled on the bed. She pulled a black scoop-necked blouse out of her waist band and up and over her head to reveal a beige, satiny bra with a lacy trim as well as a tiny gold chain with a barely-there gold circle pendant at the end. The pendant swung off to one side and lay flush against her skin as she wriggled out of her shirt.

She wriggled out of her trousers as well and slid them down over her hips.

John stood above her, eyeing her as if he was plotting a course and finally pushed his trousers down over his hips till he stood above her in just his soft black jersey boxer briefs. Sandra had almost forgotten about John’s leg until suddenly it was there right in front of her. She kept her eyes on Kennex’s face and watched him study her, but she saw the silver bands (where the three sections of the prosthetic connected) contrasting with the peachy-brown skin of the hologram out of her periphery.

She was stunning; soft petite curves, sweet satiny soft beige panties that matched the bra, and her skin was smooth and creamy, almost milk-white in some of the areas that probably never saw the sun.

John lowered himself gently, almost tentatively, down between her legs, and she in turn wrapped her legs and arms around him as they began kissing again. She slid up against him, rutting against the front of his boxer briefs and sliding purposefully up and back against his now-hardening length.

He pushed away from her lips and pressed his face down to the curve of her bra cup, pressing a nipple up and out to peak above the lacy edge. He closed his mouth around it and sucked and she pulled him to it, raising her hips and thrusting up into him.

He licked and tongued at the pretty nipple until it was wet and hardened and he pressed himself against her. She was so small compared to his frame and he hesitated to put all of his weight on top of her.

Sandra sensed it, and she pushed herself up against him, rutting her hips against him even harder than she had before, and said breathily, “You’re not going to crush me, John.”

John responded by sliding his arm under her ass and pulling her up against him. The pressure on her back and the strength of the arm beneath her caused a moan to escape her lips.

He turned his attention to the next nipple, sliding the strap of her bra down until the cups were below her breasts, pushing them up and out towards his face. He gave this one the same treatment that he’d given the other, tonguing and rubbing his lips across it side to side as it stiffened under his attention.

The hand that he had snaked around her slid down to her ass and beyond, and pressed up against the hot wet spot dampening between her legs; he slid a finger in between the fabric of her panties and stroked the wet fuzzy skin beneath with the tip of his middle finger.

“Nnnhhhhgg,” she moaned, as the roughly-textured finger breached the satin of her panties and explored delicate folds.

Sandra stretched her legs out straight towards her toes, sliding so that they were flush under John, and then brought her right foot up behind her and pushed off against the bed to flip the two or them over so that she straddled his hips, and she started to move.

“Take those off,” John whispered hoarsely, and Sandra moaned again. She lifted herself up to her knees and John slid the panties down. She lifted one knee up and wriggled out of the leg and repeated the action on the other side so that she was nearly naked, save for the bra still attached around her midsection that her breasts had long-since abandoned.

She slid backwards off of Kennex, and stood between his organic knee and his synthetic knee; she grabbed the elastic band of his shorts and slid them down to and over his ankles and then dropped them on the floor. She stood over Kennex and reached back to unclasp her bra and let it drop.

_Damn, but he's beautiful; six feet of taut muscle, naked and hard, cock bobbing up to his belly -- unreal._

She climbed back up to him and straddled the flat plane above his cock and looked at him in the eyes for a moment. She drank in the sight of his naked torso, the sexy curves of the muscles of his arms where they met his shoulders, and the fuzzy patch that tufted down his torso to where it disappeared beneath her.

“Sandra… Is this? …Is this okay? I mean, I just wanna make sure that…”

This time, Sandra interrupted John, relishing in the payback and said, “How is it that someone who hardly ever talks _never_ shuts up?” It was playful, and had only pretend heat behind it. A lock of her hair slipped out from behind her ear and curved around the crook of her smile.

The comment broke the tension, and John grinned. He shifted beneath her and she felt his cock twitch, warm and smooth, where it rested against the crease between her ass cheeks.

“I think I know how I’m going to shut you up…” she said breathily, and leaned down to his face as if she was going to kiss him, but instead reached out and grabbed his hands and slid them up over his head so that a full breast dangled over his lips. It nuzzled his nose till he caught it with his tongue and pulled it into his mouth, sucking gently while circling the tip.

She shifted and brought the other nipple to his mouth and he lathed it in the same fashion, arms still stretched above his head where Maldonado held him.

She scooted her body up his chest and let go of his hands to twine her fingers into his hair. He threaded his arms, one at a time, between her thighs and his chest, and cupped her ass, pressing her up towards his face and eyed her sensually.

“Is this what you had in mind?” he asked as he shimmied down and disappeared between her thighs until only his eyes and nose were visible across the plane of her belly.

“Oh, yes. Exactly. This is the perfect way to hush John Kennex -- keep his fucking mouth busy.”

With that, he parted her lips with his tongue and began to work the sensitive folds until his lips and tongue were fully seated inside her. He licked and sucked and moaned, letting his senses be filled with the taste and feel of her.

“Onnngh,” she cried, and relished the feel of his stubbled chin contrasting against the smoothness of her lips. She twined her fingers through the soft spikes of his hair as he cupped her ass and steadied her above his eagerly-lapping lips and tongue. The ministrations of his tongue encouraged a slow thrust from her, and soon she was literally undulating herself against his face, riding his lips and chin like she was tall in the saddle.

In Texas, if someone tells you that ‘it's been a minute since...’ they are referring to a period of time that could theoretically be anywhere from about two weeks to six months, depending on the context; a _hot_ minute, as in, ‘Man! I ain't seen that cat in a _hot_ minute!’ can be an even longer period of time, as many as six or seven years (again, depending on the context).

For Kennex, it'd been a hot minute.

To be fair, it'd actually been 1,419,120 minutes since the last time he’d had sex (with a beautiful woman, on a bed, just to keep it clear) but really...

Who was counting?

As he licked and sucked and listened to the delicious utterances escaping Sandra’s lips, relishing in the thought that she was making those sounds because of what he was doing to her and delighting in each new surge of wetness, he felt himself growing harder and harder; so hard, in fact, that he wondered if he might even come just from the intensity of the situation coupled with the length of time that it had been since the last time he’d had intimate human contact. He hadn't realized just how hungry he was for this kind of intimacy until the moment that they’d kissed, and then suddenly his appetite was overwhelming. Desperate for friction, he slid his hands up Sandra’s back and shifted her, re-positioning her so that she laid on her back with her knees splayed wide and returned his attention to the hard pink nub between her thighs. As he licked and sucked and suckled and teased, he slid his hardening length along the sheets and thrust himself against them.

“…nnngghh…yes... like that….oh, that feels good…Oh, John…I’m close…slide your fingers inside me,” Sandra said. She’d captured her nipples in between forefingers and thumbs and was rolling them gently, hardening them again and adding fire to the sensation rumbling between her thighs.

John continued to lick but slid two scouting fingers into Sandra and she rocked against them. As she slickened with another surge of wetness, she slid her hands down to her thighs and pressed them apart, stretching her lips and spreading herself as wide as she could to John. The stretch pushed her even closer to her orgasm and she arched her back up. John slid two strong and sure fingers in and out of her and she began to tighten. She was so close, so on the edge, and she slid her right hand down to massage her clit while John continued sliding his fingers in and out of her.

With the middle and ring finger of her right hand she made little circles that increased in speed and tension until suddenly she was crooked at the core, and the muscles currently enveloping Kennex’s fingers gripped and squeezed again and again in a steady pulse.

“Onnngh!” she cried out, grabbing Kennex’s wrist to still the thrust of his fingers. “Guuuhhh…”

She shuddered as the surge ran through her, bending her again at the waist, and she relished in the little trembling aftershocks of her orgasm. She giggled and drew one knee up to her chest and rocked slightly to the side, squeezing her belly again to ride the last waves, and suddenly, all of the tension was gone from her body. She lay boneless, and her skin glowed.  
  
“Yes.” She whispered through a closed-eyed grin, and when she opened her eyes again, she found John propped up on a crooked elbow staring at her intently with a little sexy satisfied grin on his face.

_Adorable cocky bastard._

He raised an eyebrow at her as if to say, _‘Return the favor?_ ’ and she chuckled at him and then reached out towards the nightstand. She pushed against Kennex’s chest and rolled him over onto his back, and leaned across to quickly open the drawer and retrieve a pair of condoms and some lube.

Maldonado dropped two condoms on the bed next to John’s hip (you know, just in case) and lowered herself down to kiss a path across his nipples and down his chest. John watched the top of her head as she raked her lips across his torso, and raised his eyes to the ceiling as she continued kissing a path towards lower regions. When her lips kissed the area right below his belly button, he closed his eyes and let out a trembling exhale.

Suddenly, John felt entirely engulfed with the unmistakable warmth and wetness of a willing mouth, and he shuddered down to his organic and bionic toes. Sandra slid her right hand up and down the shaft while she sucked the tip, and John let go the groan that was building in his throat. The suction was incredible, and the movement of her hand up and down and around the length coupled with the suction bordered on divine.

At her insistent touches and kisses and strokes, his whines began to morph into low growls, and he grasped at her hair, pulling it up and away from her face and fisting it. He shook the handful of hair in time to the rhythm of her strokes, and she could tell by the pulls that he wanted her to speed up, so she did.

The growls increased and turned into pants and sweet ‘ohs’ that he pushed out rhythmically through his nose. Sandra sat up and ripped a condom package open with her teeth and slid it expertly down his length and squeezed a swirl of lube right at the tip. She smeared it till it covered it and then rocked back on to the bed, knees splayed wide, and gave John an inviting look.

John scrabbled up onto his left knee and lowered himself into her. The both let out a groan of relief, and John began to rock up and back. He slid his hands palms-up between her back and the sheets and closed his fingers around her narrow shoulders, pulling himself deeper into her. She pushed her knees up and clasped her ankles around his back, angling herself perfectly against his thrusts. They clung against each other, rutting sweatily together, until John began to shake.

“Oh, Yes. Come for me, _Jahn_ ,” Sandra whispered, with just enough rasp to make it sexy. “I want to feel you do it…”

She spoke low and John could feel her hot breath right on his ear and it sent him, really fucking just sent him, right over the edge. He cried out and thrusted, arching his back and pressing in, and then the movements stopped (save for the trembling).

“Wooo!” he cried out, and Sandra had to giggle again.

He slid out and flopped gracelessly onto his back, snapping the condom off and knotting it. From seemingly out of nowhere, Sandra handed him a small towel which he ran against himself, still gasping. They lay back on opposite sides of the bed, still heaving breaths, and John tossed the towel over the side to the floor below.

He looked at her and she lolled her head over and gave him an open-mouthed smile. He raised his hand up and she slapped him a high five and then they both giggled again. Finally she grasped the hand and pulled herself towards him to curl into the crook of his arm.

When she was settled against him he wound his arm around her and stroked her hair, still staring at the ceiling.

“How do you feel?”

“Relaxed…”

“…well, mission accomplished,” John declared, and Sandra laughed again and started a slow drift into sleep. 

**Author's Note:**

> Info on the Shakespeare misquote (as well as the Top 10 Shakespeare Misquotes) can be found here: http://listverse.com/2008/09/15/top-10-shakespeare-misquotes/


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